The Thing Wearing Your Skin
by AMKelley
Summary: Josh is having morbid nightmares and he's afraid the Bogeyman is going to get him. Alex brushes it off as nonsense at first, but he can't help but think there's a deeper meaning to it. **Spoilers for SH: Homecoming**


I couldn't sleep. My mind wouldn't slow down and my eyes refused to shut despite my best efforts. I rolled over onto my side with my back facing the wall and sighed in frustration, shifting uncomfortably beneath my blankets. It was too damn hot for blankets but it felt weird to sleep without them. I twisted in them. Why was I so damn restless?

My eyes were more than adjusted to the absence of light which made it even more difficult to fall asleep. I didn't even know what time it was or how long I could've been lying here awake. It could've just been minutes, but it felt like hours.

Somewhere in the night I yawned and my eyelids got heavy, eventually closing so my body could be consumed in the darkness around me. I fell asleep to a dreamless night, which wasn't as unusual as one would think. The shadows danced around my body in my unconscious slumber but there was something wrong. Something unsettling about the atmosphere in the room.

By reflex my eyelids snapped open and I couldn't see anything. It was dark again with the exception of a flicker of light shinning on the wall furthest from me. At first I thought it was headlights but that seemed unlikely at this time of night, whatever time it was. No, the source was right below me on the bottom bunk and it wasn't moving.

Josh.

I wondered for a half second if he felt the same disturbance I had felt during my shortly lived sleep, but that was a little silly. I couldn't tell what it was that I felt in the first place. Wide awake now, I rolled on my back and stared into the darkness waiting for the light to click off. But it didn't. It moved a little out of the corner of my eye and it seemed to get a little brighter. My damn eyes were adjusting again. I cursed quietly.

"Josh," I said groggily. "Turn off the light."

No response.

"Turn it off, Josh."

Still nothing. Not even the sound of him breathing could reach my ears and he was right below me. I sat up and rubbed at my eyes, turning my head towards the light that illuminated the various drawings tacked up on the wall. Nothing but insects and toy soldiers of all colors scrawled across white construction paper. There was a sudden wave of worry that washed over me.

I swung my legs over the side of the bed and hopped down as quietly as I could manage, blocking the beam of light from reaching the wall and in turn blinding me. My hand came out in front of my eyes to block it out but it only filtered through my parted fingers. I stepped to the right and saw Josh sitting crossed legged with his back against the wall, seeming to be staring at something.

"Josh? Why aren't you asleep?" I looked into his eyes and they were pitch black. A shiver ran down my spine and frustration surfaced with my voice despite me wanting it to. "Answer me!"

Josh's head snapped towards me and I flinched away for a moment. He looked so different. Josh lowered the light to where it pointed up towards his face, illuminating it in an eerie glow and if I didn't know better he could be someone entirely different. A shade of my real brother.

"Josh?" I repeated.

"I can't sleep," he whispered as if someone of something would hear him. "I can't sleep or else he'll get me."

Curiosity clouded my better judgment and I ducked my head underneath the top bunk to sit next to Josh on the bottom. His head followed my movements and when I turned back to him his eyes were wide with fear. It had to be nightmares again. Josh got them often and it showed around his eyes. The somewhat haunted look he'd give me whenever I was around or the fact that he had dark circles under his eyes.

It wasn't healthy.

"Who will get you if you sleep?" I asked.

"The grey man," he said.

"This grey man wouldn't happen to be the Bogeyman?"

"You've seen him too?" Josh whispered hastily.

Josh's eyebrows quirked up in anticipation as if he was the only one who could see the Bogeyman, in which this case he was. Was he really that worried about a made up monster? Josh knew better than to believe in stuff like that. I moved closer to him and put a hand on his knee in reassurance.

"Sure I have. When I was your age I had a Bogeyman that would hide in my closet and when I'd fall asleep he'd go underneath my bed." I had to make feel like he wasn't the only one who had a Bogeyman. He needed to be consoled. "But there's something you need to understand, Josh, the Bogeyman isn't real. He can't hurt you because he doesn't exist."

"But he does exist," Josh argued.

I got up and walked over to the closet, telling Josh to shine the light towards the door so he could prove that the Bogeyman wasn't in the room and that he wasn't real.

"See? No Bogeyman," I said.

When I got back to the bed and sat down with Josh he didn't looked very convinced, but I couldn't really blame him since all kids were stubborn. The light I gave to him pointed back up, this time illuminating both of our faces in the dark. I don't know why I didn't just turn on the light.

"He doesn't live in the closet."

"Where does he live?"

"Here. In Shepherd's Glen. But it's not Shepherd's Glen. It looks like it, but much darker and decayed. Like my dreams. The Grey Man lives there with his friends. He can't see, but he can hear us."

"Who?" I ask.

"Me and Joey," Josh murmured.

So that explains it.

"Has Joey been putting these stories in your head?" I inquire, knowing how kids will spread rumors to scare others and make them believe it's real. Joey was a nice kid, if not a little spoiled, and he got along with Josh, but this wasn't a very nice thing he did. "What did Joey tell you?"

"He doesn't speak anymore," Josh replied, his dark eyes blinking and his mouth in a thin line.

He sounded so sure and his voice wasn't filled with fear or remorse. It sounded like he was telling the truth and it made goosebumps prickle along my arms despite the heat. Josh was being to scare me but I couldn't let him see that. It was just his dreams, right? Why should I be scared?

"Why doesn't he speak?"

Josh was fidgeting with the light and he bit his lip as if not wanting to talk about it, but he relented and looked at me with dark eyes. He didn't say anything for a moment, just stared, but I put my hand back on his knee as if to say it was alright.

"Because the ground swallowed him up," Josh whispered secretly. "They made Joey's daddy do it. He lives there now. In the ground. He lives there because God said so and they want God to be happy and not mad at them. But it doesn't stop the grey man."

My heart was beating faster, I noticed, and Josh's face or eyes didn't waver for one second. It was morbid to say the least and even though I hadn't dreamt what Josh had dreamt, I felt like I've see it before or heard it somewhere. Like déjà vu. I'm not one to be scared easily, but the way Josh looks and speaks chills me to the bone.

"What does the grey man look like?"

"He's tall and pale and covered in blood. He carries a big long knife-"

"What about his face, Josh?" I cut off.

"He doesn't have one," Josh says. "He wears a triangle on his head."

I consciously moved closer to Josh as if the grey man was actually here in this room. I wrap my arm around his shoulders and he clings to my bare chest with a shiver and his body is trembling against me. It could be that he's cold but that's too unlikely because I'm burning up and I'm only wearing boxers.

The light is toppled over on the mattress now so I pick it up and hold it in my free hand, the other slightly squeezing Josh's tiny shoulder. My face is buried in his hair now and I hold him as tightly as I can, thinking that someone might take him away if I let go.

"He's a bad, bad man, Alex," Josh nearly whimpers and Alex knows he's truly frightened. "He rips them apart and cuts their heads off until there's nothing but blood left. He likes their blood because it's warm and he's always cold. But the thing on the boat isn't nice either."

Josh is looking up into my shadowy face now and I can barely make out the color of his eyes, but they seem dialated and wide. Black. I clutch him closer and wait for him to continue because I know he isn't done. He's never sounded more frightened and it sounds too real and too vivid to be a tall tale. Where were these dreams coming from?

"He looks nice and acts nice, but he always kills me in the lake. We row out and he gets mad at me and pushes me into the water. I drown and the thing rows away until I can't see or breath anymore."

"What thing?"

"The thing wearing your skin."

My body flushed and my skin prickled with fear. I didn't want to hear Josh's dreams anymore because now I was beginning to think they were real. I went to get up but Josh clung to my arm tightly and I turned around, shinning the light at him. His eyes were brown again and they pleaded silently to me.

"Can I sleep in your bunk with you tonight, Alex?" Josh pleaded, big puppy eyes gleaming in the light. "Please?"

I handed him the light and bent down to collect him in my arms, his body warm and fragile as I raised him up onto my bunk. He shined the light so I could climb on without falling and as I lied down he snuggle up to me. I draped the blanket over us and I wrapped my arms around him as if to keep him safe, the sweet smell of his hair tickling my nose silly.

One of his small hands rested against my chest and traced little circles with his index finger as if he was to preoccupied. His legs shifted a few times against me until they wrapped around my legs and I was too warm for this magnitude of cuddling and clinging, but it was Josh and he was afraid. I didn't dare let go of him.

"I'm not going anywhere, Josh. You're safe now," I reassured, planting a kiss to the top of his head. "I love you."

"Promise?"

I didn't know whether he was talking about me not leaving him or being safe or loving him, but I would never leave him or let him get hurt and I loved him with all my heart. Even if he was favored over me all these years. I could never hurt Josh, not even in my dreams.

"I promise."

But that was a lie. Wasn't it?


End file.
